The Walt Longmire Mystery Series Boxed Set Volumes 1-4 (80 page)

He pulled the heavy leather coat aside and climbed in, fastening his seatbelt and pulling the Special Forces tomahawk from behind him. The carbon steel surface absorbed light like a black hole. “Here.”

I shook my head. “I don’t want that thing; I wouldn’t know what to do with it.” I patted the chrome handle of the tiny automatic, which was sticking out from my belt, balanced the Remington on my shoulder, and felt the .45 in the holster. “I have every gun we’ve got.” He nodded and glanced toward the ridge. “Radio Double Tough and have him call in. I’ll be here.” He nodded and kept looking at me. “Aren’t you going to turn on the lights?” I reached in and hit the switch he was looking for as the blue and red reflectors bled ghosts of light across the late afternoon snow.

He watched them for a moment. “This is the best part of your job.” He placed a hand against the driver’s side window as he passed, the large dark fingers unraveling against the glass like hemp rope.

I watched as the truck struggled to stay alongside the canyon wall, disappearing in the snow as the darker gray of its outline grew lighter with the distance, and the sound of the big Detroit motor planed, muffled, and vanished. I stood there for a while longer, wondering, like I always did, if this was the right thing to do. It looked like it was going to be a long night, so I turned and started the trudge back to the trailer. I was interrupted by a weak call on the radio.

Static. “Hey Sheriff, this is BR75115.The weather is comin’ in, just like . . .” I pulled the radio from my belt. “Absaroka County Sheriff Unit One, come in?” After a moment, a very faint signal came through.

Static. “Hey, Sheriff, how you . . .”

I smiled. “I’m good, how about you?”

Static. “I’m fired.”

The signal faded out completely, and I readjusted the gain. “Hello? Jess?” Nothing. I dropped my head a little and then keyed the mic again. “Jess, if you can hear me?” At least Henry had gotten out. I tried the radio again. Static. I looked at the radio, thought about my luck, and keyed the mic one final time.

Static. Damn.

* * *

I walked around to the back of the trailer so that Leo wouldn’t notice any more of my tracks. I closed the door behind me and decided to check the other rooms. There was a back bedroom at the end of the hall with another mattress squatting in the corner, a particleboard dresser that had seen better days, and a vintage console television. There was nothing in the closet but old clothes and well-worn shoes, giving me an indication of the frugal life that Ellen Runs Horse must live. The next room was a lot more interesting; there was a card table with Sterno burners and all the products used to produce meth on a clandestine laboratory scale. The floorboards were lined with plastic gallon jugs containing the toxic castoff of the operation, and it was evident that Leo’s drug venture was still a going concern.

I walked into the living room and looked at the beat-to-shit fake tree and wished it a Merry Christmas. The ornaments were made out of Mason jar lids with glue around the threaded edges to hold on the glitter, and there were bows of knitting yarn and ribbons to make the tiny ornaments brave; some of them used photographs that were old enough to be in Henry’s Mennonite collection. There was a sepia one that carried the bruised image of a young girl with braids playing marbles. She had on a cap and an old jacket and a face of utmost concentration. I turned the ornament in my hand and read on the back, printed in block letters, ELLEN WALKS OVER ICE. There was another of a young man in a Thermopolis varsity football uniform doing the old chuck and duck; I could see that it was Leo. I turned it over to confirm my guess; the block letters said simply LEO, with no surname.

There were others, but the one that next caught my attention was one toward the back; I guess I noticed it because its face was turned toward the wall. It twisted gently as I watched, revealing a very young Leo with the man who must be his father. He had on a hat, a broad-brim, flattop like the Powder River cowboys wore, and his head was tilted down to the young Leo, the hat hiding the eyes. The jawline was discernible, along with the lips. The connection to Ellen was there, but the black-and-white photo did nothing to tell me whether his skin was white or red; he didn’t look particularly Indian nor did he look particularly like Charlie. It was like doing a lineup with jigsaw puzzles. I turned the ornament over, but all it said was LEO & FATHER. He was her son, and she hadn’t even written down his name, but she had cared enough to keep track.

I had the sandwiches that Dorothy had made and the coffee, so I had something to eat and drink. I went over and retrieved one of the jugs of water as well, the one that was only half frozen. I might need it and, if I didn’t keep it with me, chances are it wasn’t going to stay thawed. I gathered the blankets that were left and the buffalo robe, dragging them to a chair so as to sit as far away from the creamed corn as the furniture would allow. I pulled the Mag Lite from my belt for future use, placed the ornament on one knee, and pulled the little automatic out and rested it on my other knee. I placed the shotgun between my legs and pulled the .45 from my holster and checked it again. I felt like Zapata.

I studied the ornament and stared at the partial face, knowing that I had seen this man, knowing that he was out there, knowing that he and Leo were in cahoots, cahoots being a legal term in Wyoming, see cahooting in the first degree, intent to cahoot, and so on.

I sat there and thought about what a long wait this might turn into and about the course of things and looked around again. I noticed a strap sticking out from under the couch Ellen had been sitting on that was made from the kind of tubular webbing that is used for backpacks. I sat the gun on the floor along with the ornament, flipped back the buffalo robe, and moved across the small room to kneel by the sofa. The strap was followed by a grimy daypack. The zipper to the main compartment was broken, but it had been fastened together with large safety pins. I unhooked the pins and had a look inside: dozens of small glass bottles and a small bundle wrapped in the
Durant Courant
containing close to what looked like about $40,000 in mixed currency.

Leo, you bad boy. Whether he would slog his way through a blizzard to the middle fork of Crazy Woman to a trailer and his loopy grandmother was suddenly academic. Leo might leave his grandmother to starve to death, but he would come back for the drugs and the money.

I put the bundle back in the knapsack and stuffed the bag under the sofa when I noticed a battered cooler in the kitchen. I wondered what Leo might have put in there. The kitchen reminded me of my grumbling stomach, but my curiosity was stronger than my appetite. If I had been hungry, I wasn’t anymore. I pulled the aged skull of an adult male from the cooler. I leaned against the counter and held it in my hand. “Alas, poor Charlie.” The prominent gold tooth was there, central incisor, right. I guess Double Tough hadn’t looked at the head; I didn’t blame him. “You got off easy, you son of a bitch.”

I carefully placed the skull back in the cooler and walked over to the window where I raised the blind just far enough to see a fog bank beginning to form along the shadowed canyon wall. The creek water must have been warmer than the air and, if the low cloud cover held, this was going to be a very foggy, as well as dark, place in about thirty minutes. Now all I had to do was relax and watch what little light there was at the bottom of the windows die.

* * *

Static. “Unit One, this is BR75115, come in?”

The blankets slipped and the ornament fell to the floor, but at least I didn’t shoot the door. I had forgotten to turn off the radio. I struggled through the folds in the blanket and pulled it out, the small glow of the channel display providing a comforting light. “Hey Jess. You got through. Over?”

Static. “Sheriff, I’m at the base radio at equipment storage. I’ve got your dog here, and he’s been shot.”

I stared at the radio as a million and one things ran through my mind, all of them bad. “Are you sure?”

Static. “Yeah, I’m sure. It looks like a small caliber. I’m doing all I can for him.”

“How did he get there?”

Static. “He must’a drug himself. I went out and followed the blood trail as far as I could, but you can’t see a damn thing with all this fog.”

I thought about Henry. If Dog was shot . . . “I’m going to need you to call my office, tell them that I think we’ve got a man down and that we need all the help we can get. Then get the HPs out here.”

Static. “Roger that, out.”

Here I sat with every weapon that we had, and my closest friend and blood brother was probably dead out there in the snow somewhere. It was a solid three miles back to the methane wells and that was if I could find him. That’s if Leo left him, and what were the chances that Leo would have left him alive?

I’m lousy at ignoring first instincts and mine told me to gather the weapons and head out. I stuffed the little automatic back in my belt, holstered the .45 cocked and locked along with the Mag Lite, pulled the buffalo robe around me, and flipped the shotgun up on my shoulder. I stuffed the ornament into my duty jacket and started for the door, opened it, and sidestepped. I pulled my hat down tight and raised my head slowly to look into the vaporous white. Barely visible in the fog were blue and red lights that blinked across the blurred canyon walls.

My truck.

The headlights were shining at an odd angle and the blue and red ones were simply revolving in place, so I was pretty sure Leo had misjudged the width of the trail and had planted the three-quarter ton over the edge. He was lucky he had done it near the bottom, or the truck would have flipped and killed him. The headlights cast to the left, away from the homestead and the trailer. I stepped down and pulled the door closed quietly behind me.

It was only about 150 yards, but the fog made it seem like miles. I started the slow trudge, staying to the right and keeping my one eye on the slightly illuminated portion of the white distance. If he was coming to the trailer, he was going to have to cross that bit of diffused light and, when he did, I would be there.

I lowered the Remington from my shoulder and allowed it to swing forward; with all my training, here I was shooting with one eye. There was a movement to my left, just out of the headlight beams. I unfocused as always, allowing my eye to become a motion detector, and waited until whatever it was out there moved again. It did, and it was large. Not only tall but wide. I stood there, watching as it lumbered into view, in no way the outline of a man. It was at least four feet across and as tall as I am. I was thinking that it was a cow, confused and trying to find some relief from the storm or a horse trying to do the same. It was a blur in the fog. It swayed there for a moment, and it seemed as though a wing extended outward and then folded back.

After a few seconds, the wing extended again and caught a small movement of the air, then flipped sideways only to fall. It shifted its weight and then both wings caught the breeze, and I was sure the thing would take flight. My mouth fell open, and my mind was jarred to the image of Henry at the Busy Bee when he had spread the wings on his duster, his battle cry shaking the windows of the café.

The fog froze the inside of my mouth. “Bear?”

The blast was instantaneous. Leo had been waiting, hoping that I would say something in recognition, and I had.

It was as if someone had tied a rope around my leg and tied it to a galloping stallion. I couldn’t move. Leg, left, and I thought of bone and the artery as the immediate shock sparked and then subsided. The reason his shadow had been so deformed was that he was carrying Ellen, which meant my shot had to be low. He wasn’t expecting a return volley and was probably as surprised as I had been when he pitched backward with the flame of the Remington still in my hands.

I fell with the recoil, and the barrel of the shotgun buried itself in the snow and frozen ground below, useless. I rolled to the left, trying to keep him in view, but all I could see was the freezing fog that reflected in the dimness of the truck’s lights. The pain in my leg clinched my guts and pulled my knees forward even as I tried to negotiate my left arm up for leverage. He was down too, but I couldn’t be sure which of us would be able to get up first; the smart money would be on the man hyped on crystal meth.

My hat rolled from my head and rested there in the snow as I looked up. He seemed to be growing from the crusted surface. Henry’s coat tried to hold him against the ground for me and, along with the burden of Ellen Runs Horse, did pin him just long enough for me to get the .32 up and out, the .45 still buried at my side.

I attempted to time the squeeze on the .32, waiting until a lull in the pain allowed my aim to stay steady long enough to fire off my only round, the chrome pistol extended into the fog. I felt like one of those near frozen buffalo in imminent danger of being torn apart by a pack of wolves, just waiting for one of those wolves to get close enough. I pulled the trigger, and the little semiautomatic roared and bucked in my hand.

The air left his body as the impact of the slug carried his teetering momentum back. Center shot, or close enough. He fell with an angry, gargling sound, and the report of his pistol smacked like a bullwhip. His shot went off harmlessly into the frosted air.

I slumped down against my side and breathed again, the cold flood of oxygen inflating my chest as well as causing the searing pain in my thigh to start up again. I took a few more breaths and rolled my head back to look at him. He had collapsed backward on his shattered legs, doubled back as though he had been playing some perverse game of limbo. I stayed steady, looking at him, and tried to reassemble my mind so that I could begin making assessments on how badly I was hurt, how soon I could reach Ellen Runs Horse, and how long it would take me to get us both to cover.

Then he moved.

It was a feeble gesture at first, almost an involuntary one, but it was a movement nonetheless. I felt my single eye widen as his hand, still holding a very large stainless revolver, scrambled up from the snow like an antiaircraft battery. A shoulder surged forward as the other arm fought to push him up; like his grandfather, Leo would not stay in the grave.